How to Turn the Ferguson Protests into a New Civil Rights Movement

America is at the proverbial crossroads. We’re trapped by racism and poverty, and a town called Ferguson—where I have been working since the day before Michael Brown’s funeral—has shown us that we haven’t yet decided which path we want to take.

Down one of the pathways is the future. Powered by one of the most diverse and tech-savvy populations in the world, our beloved, conflicted country has what it takes to solve the world’s problems. It won’t be easy, but you can’t tell me we lack the vision and creative talent needed to end problems like police brutality and poverty—all while building an equitable and just society.

You can walk on any college campus or down any urban block and see that we have the brainpower and swag to innovate our way to what Martin Luther King Jr. called the “Beloved Community,” a world without poverty and racism. Just like the Black Panthers, and the leaders of civil-rights movement before us, we’re crowd-sourcing campaigns that build the community and social programs to fix our many problems.

There is another path, however, that we’ve been enticed to stay on for quite some time.

Racism, sexism, and structural inequality are so familiar to us that it’s almost hard not to stay the current course. Our past, and all of its ugliness, just keeps lingering and pushing us to repeat the mistakes of previous generations. In this country, the fact that more black men are incarcerated or on probation or parole in 2014 than were enslaved in 1850 isn’t futuristic at all. It’s quite backward. Period. But here we are: watching the events unravel in Ferguson as if it’s 1967, and everything is in black and white.

We must pick the first path, we have no choice. But to move on down that road, we are going to need a serious intervention, and we need it now. The weight of the 20th century is holding us back.

The longer we wait to chose to take that first step toward the future, the harder it gets. Our country is literally burning. Wealth inequality is reaching near Great Depression levels. To truly transform our society to one that sees fewer Mike Browns, we’re going to need to rely on more than campaign slogans and bickering politicians.

Good thing our generation hasn’t stopped dreaming. Besides the technological miracles that assist our struggle, we have also developed emotional intelligence that helps us challenge the traditional boundaries of identity politics. Even in Ferguson, I’ve seen 50-year-old white people chanting, “Black lives matter!,” in front of riot police. It’s depressing that we’re still dealing with these issues, but most of us are on the right side of history. Most of us.

Although many of us live in segregated communities, technology has brought us together in previously unimaginable ways. We may never live on the same blocks or hang out in the same restaurants or bars, but our common interests are intrinsically intertwined. Some people are never going to get it, and for them it’s to the hinterland, as America’s growing diversity will rapidly alter the face of the country over the next two to three decades.

To make this work, we’re going to have to get honest with each other. Our expanding personal freedoms, combined with technological advances, have seen us acting more individualistically than those that have come before us. Let’s admit it. Millennials are less likely to join a traditional organization like religion than older generations, but social media like Ustream, Twitter, and Instagram allows each of us to be leaders in previously unimaginable ways. While critics call our urge to document our lives narcissistic, it’s a lot deeper than that. As Americans, we know that there is nothing more powerful than our voice and opinions. Thrown in with a selfie here and there, our frequent status updates have disrupted the status quo.

Unfortunately, they have also seen us also getting into a distracting Twitter beef or two. Anybody who’s spent anytime on the Ferguson front line will tell you that ego has occasionally prevented leaders from working together in lock step. Like schools of fish in the mighty Mississippi, the movement has come together for big actions, but has occasionally been divided by the changing landscape and shifting narratives. The independence and freedom of swarm organizing allows for organizations and leaders to carve unique niches in the landscape. But the lack of coordination also sees us not building enough power to finally end the systems of oppression that allow the Darren Wilsons of the world to get away with murder.

We don’t need absolute unity, but if we’re going to get to the future, our movement is going to have to get better at getting on the same page. The New Jim Crow, along with its many tentacles, like voter suppression, and poverty, will not be easily beaten. Swarm organizing has helped us shine a spotlight on the continued systematic oppression that plagues this country. But if we are going to have the courage to walk down a more just path, we’re going to have to have enough focus to shut down corrupt institutions and end bad policies that have been kicking our ass for the last 30 years.

We can take the first step together, right now, by working to ensure that the Department of Justice acts in Ferguson immediately. It doesn’t take a constitutional scholar to see that something was wrong with the grand jury process. The department should not only file civil-rights charges against Darren Wilson, but against the entire Ferguson police department. There have been far too many inconsistencies in the case, and many have accused the tiny department of discrimination. We also have to demand that they put a magnifying glass on prosecuting attorney Bob McCulloch and the St. Louis County court system.

But that’s the easy victory. Our generation must push all of our leaders to demand that they drastically alter the way we police our communities. Game-changing policies like Prop 47, which passed in November in California, will begin to take the wind out of the War on Drugs, as many nonviolent crimes in the Golden State are reduced to misdemeanors. But we have to also pull the plug on, or dramatically alter, the federal programs that prop up local police departments. I mean, damn: Can we at least get more Police Athletic Leagues and core service programs? Pretty much everyone agrees that continuing to arm problematic police departments like Ferguson with more riot gear and tear gas is a bad idea. It’s time to do something different, and to hold politicians whose records don’t match good thinking—like Ferguson’s own congressman, Rep. William Lacy Clay, who recently voted against stopping the flow of military equipment to local police departments—accountable.

It will take courage to build the kind of trust that will see us adopting the programs and campaigns that enable us to work together and march toward tomorrow. Divide and conquer politics, like those employed in Ferguson, have long been a common tactic used by those who are afraid to see America progress. Distrust and division, all too familiar distractions, can be overcome, if we focus on building a society that grants us all access to the benefits that our hard work produces.

Getting to that better future won’t be easy, but I think we’re ready to take a step. We just have to be brave enough to do it. If we step boldly, with a willingness to abandon broken systems and blow up racism and poverty, we can do it. If not, we will be forever trapped in the past.

Based in Milwaukee, Dr. Robert “Biko” Baker is an academic and activist working at the intersection of culture, technology, and politics. The longtime executive director of the League of Young Voters, Baker is a pioneer in running city-level G.O.T.V. campaigns that dramatically increase voter turnout among the Rising American Electorate. Recently, he's teamed up with pop icon and philanthropist Snoop Dogg for a campaign called No Guns Allowed, which seeks to reduce inner-city gun violence. He is currently helping incubate Hands Up United, a nationwide effort launched in Ferguson that seeks to end the New Jim Crow. Baker holds a Ph.D. in history from U.C.L.A.